Research Reports

Overview

The NRCCTE’s research focuses on issues of urgency to both the field of CTE and the nation’s higher education system, recovering economy, and evolving labor market, addressing such topics as programs of study (POS)/career pathways, curriculum integration of CTE and academic content knowledge and skills, postsecondary student retention and completion, and professional development for educators in the areas of data use for program improvement and support for alternatively certified CTE educators.

Research Reports

Programs of Study as a State Policy Mandate: A Longitudinal Study of the South Carolina Personal Pathways to Success Initiative

This is the final technical report from the NRCCTE's five-year longitudinal study of South Carolina's Personal Pathway to Success initiative, which was authorized by the state's Education and Economic Development Act (EEDA) in 2005. NRCCTE-affiliated researchers at the National Dropout Prevention Center at Clemson University investigated the extent to which EEDA facilitated the creation of programs of study/career pathways and whether these programs led to improved student high school and postgraduation preparation and planning. The study followed two student cohorts from a sample of eight high schools from economically and culturally diverse regions of the state.

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Mature Programs of Study: Examining Policy Implementation at the Local Level

This report presents the final results of a mixed-method longitudinal study that used a backward-mapping approach to examine mature, POS-like programs at three community colleges and their feeder high schools across the country. This study is part of the NRCCTE's portfolio of groundbreaking longitudinal research on POS in the United States.

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Work-Based Learning Opportunities for High School Students

This report provides a conceptual base for work-based learning (WBL), a strategy that helps students apply academic and technical skills and develop employability skills. WBL has been identified as an important issue for state and local program reform and implementation, but there is a need to better understand WBL as part of secondary CTE programs.

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Improving the Quality of Career and Technical Alternative Teacher Preparation

This report presents the results of the NRCCTE's five-year collaboration with SREB to develop an induction model for new CTE teachers pursuing an alternative route to certification that increases their competence, self-efficacy, and retention.

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A Typology for Understanding the Career and Technical Education Credit-Taking Experience of High School Students

Through the typology presented in this report, we have sought to provide a more nuanced way of exploring and analyzing the CTE credit-taking experience of all high school students, not just those traditionally considered CTE students. The typology provides a better framework for understanding CTE than the more traditional approach that classifies students as either academic or vocational concentrators.

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